Letters: Voter ID, capitalism, Supremes

Copyright 2012: Houston Chronicle

Updated 8:52 pm, Friday, March 30, 2012

Voter ID

Regarding "Voter ID law: Do the facts justify it?" (Page A1, Monday), the analysis didn't include some facts relevant to the question. Democrats don't think they commit voting fraud when, at the highest party level, they devise methods to game the system. The 2008 method: Use federal funds and pay ACORN to register voters based on the number of voters registered. Without Voter ID, who can challenge?

Texas is lambasted for having the highest percentage of uninsured, the largest number of Hispanics without valid photo IDs. However, significantly missing are the number and percentage of illegal immigrants who aren't eligible to vote. Also, citizens can be disqualified from voting for criminal convictions. Bottom line: Democrats don't want voter ID laws because it will cost them votes.

Regarding "American-style capitalism may need to reinvent itself" (Page B7, March 14), Thomas Friedman offers hope for capitalism to foster innovation. An economy that measures productivity solely in terms of money is flawed. Child labor laws keep youngsters from producing much money. By age 13, many children understand their participation in the unfolding history of their society. To foster American capitalism, we need to establish sustainability corps scholarships, similar to the Peace Corps commitments.

Bob Birchak, Spring

Role reversal

Regarding "Court may hand down ideology over justice" (Page B9, Friday), E.J. Dionne is correct when he says some members of the Supreme Court are acting as legislators rather than judges.

However, he has reversed the roles. The liberal justices are arguing that they should pick and choose which parts of the law should remain and which must be overturned - a legislative activity - while the conservative justices argue that without the mandate the entire act needs to be struck down, a judicial activity.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg thinks the court should do a salvage operation by going through the act and cutting and pasting. Justice Elena Kagan thinks that the expansion of Medicare on the states should be OK since they are getting a boatload of federal money.

She apparently has been in Washington so long that she forgot the federal government does not even have a boat, let alone money to put in it. The only money the feds have is from the taxpayers in the states.

Congress has already solved this problem by purposely not including a severability clause in the act, and as such, has already voted on the subject: Without the mandate, the rest of the act needs to go away.

Dell Ayres, Houston

Pope admonition

Regarding "Cuba awaits the pope" (Page B6, March 22), the editorial mildly attacks the pope in his pending visit to Cuba for not being more critical of the Castros. I agree, but with the pope's milder criticism of his American priests who molested young boys several years ago, what can you expect?

If the pope was the leader he ought to be, he would have excommunicated those guilty priests and the bishops who just moved them from one diocese to another. Dare we expect anything more from him about the leaders of Cuba?